The present invention relates to golf club heads and a method of making the same.
Generally, a golf club head is required to have strength sufficient to resist an impact and also a function to hit a ball a long distance.
A two-piece hard ball was developed in recent years, and the impact force of the ball against a golf club head was increased. This caused easy deformation or breakage of the golf clubs if they were made of a conventional material. Consequently, it has been desired to develop impact resistant materials.
To hit the ball a long distance, it is important to heighten a restitution coefficient at the moment of impact. Thus, the club face is required to possess a high strength.
Further, golf club heads desirably weigh ranging from about 200 g to about 300 g. A shot performance varies largely depending on the characteristics of the club head such as a position of the center of gravity, moment of inertia, and the shape of hitting face, even if the clubs having the same weight are used. Therefore, the golf club head is significantly required to be able to be designed freely so that the above characteristics can be controlled. In view of this, the club head is desired to be light weighted.
The club face is also required to possess corrosion resistance in view of locations where the club is used as well as the above characteristics.
Golf club heads which meet in part the existing demands are disclosed for example in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open Print No. 60-88570, Japanese Utility Model Application Laid-open Print No. 60-155556, Japanese Utility Model Application Laid-open Print No. 60-155557, and Japanese Patent Application Laid-open Print No. 61-209676.
FIG. 16 shows a golf club head disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open Print No. 60-88570. This club head has a hitting area 13 which is made of fiber-reinforced metal fixed with screws 15 in its front face 11.
This conventional golf club head, however, has possibility that the hitting area 13 comes off because the hitting area 13 made of a fiber reinforced metal is fixed to the front face 11 with the screws 15. The hitting area 13 looks incompatible with the neighboring area and may cause a dead sound.
To remedy such defects, a reinforced fiber member was integrally formed with the front face 11 by casting or the like, but, such a reinforced fiber member was dispersely contained in the molten metal to be cast. Consequently, it was difficult to increase the fiber content in view of formability problems, and it was difficult to use long fibers. In addition, there was a problem that it was difficult to dispose the reinforced fiber member at a specific position of the front face 11.